About the Reading
Each event includes a brief open mic followed by two featured poets. Pre-registration is free and recommended. The open mic includes five readers drawn lottery-style from a hat that goes out at 7:15pm. The reading starts promptly at 7:30pm. Each open mic poet reads one poem or for three minutes, whichever comes first.
About The Workshop
The Blue Hour generative writing workshop is suitable for writers and poetry fans of all levels. We will discuss a poem together, then Marty will guide the group through individual writing on an exploratory prompt that draws on themes from the poem.
Accessibility, Health, & Safety
- All restrooms at Haymarket House are gender-neutral, including single-user and stalled restrooms.
- Each event includes ASL interpretation. Haymarket House is ADA compliant and fully wheelchair-accessible; email curator@poetrycenter.org to ensure ramp access and with any other accessibility needs.
- Masks are currently strongly encouraged for all indoor events, and the space is equipped with a professional air filtration system.
A NOTE ON PARKING: Limited free and paid street parking is available near Haymarket House. The parking lot at Disney Magnet School is relatively close and is a paid lot; there are also locations nearby available through SpotHero.
About The Host
Marty McConnell is a poet, educator, and healer based in Chicago. She is the author of when they say you can’t go home again, what they mean is you were never there, winner of the 2017 Michael Waters Poetry Prize; her first full-length collection, wine for a shotgun, received the Silver Medal in the Independent Publishers Awards and was a finalist for both the Audre Lorde Award and a Lambda Literary Award. Her first nonfiction book, Gathering Voices: Creating a Community-Based Poetry Workshop, is available through YesYes Books. She is the co-creator and co-editor of underbelly, a web site focused on the art and magic of poetry revision. An MFA graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, her work has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies including Best American Poetry, Southern Humanities Review, Gulf Coast, and Indiana Review.
Learn more about the series and history >
Featured Readers
Cai Sherley (he/him) is a Black trans poet-educator with roots in Boston, MA. A two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, his work can be found in Best New Poets, swamp pink, Peach Mag, and Tupelo, among others, as well as the anthology I Feel Nothing Like Good: Poets Against Genocide. He has found homes at The Watering Hole, Brooklyn Poets, Tin House, LAMBDA, the Chicago Poetry Center, and the Fine Arts Work Center, and is a member of both the Crossroads Writers Collective and Trans Corner Poets. His debut chapbook, Out of Yearning, was released in October 2026.
Preeti Parikh is a poet and essayist with a past background in medicine and a recent MFA from the Rainier Writing Workshop. A Kundiman Fellow and National Poetry Series Finalist, she is the recipient of an Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award, a Sustainable Arts Foundation Grant Award, and a Millay Arts Residency. Her work has been supported by the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, performed in a poetry-ballet collaboration, and featured in Beloit Poetry Journal, The Cincinnati Review, The Margins, and other literary journals and anthologies.
Preeti’s collection of poems, BLUE SELVAGE, named by Debutiful as one of The Debut Poetry Collections You Need to Read in 2026, will be out in November from Tupelo Press. Born and raised in India, Preeti has now called Ohio home for nearly two decades.